Called Poco today on the neighbors kids...

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RLyons

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I feel like I'm getting to the "get off my lawn you darn kids" stage of life.

Today I look out my window to see two kids looking up at the power line in front of my house. Next thing I know I see one kid throw a golf ball as hard as he could in the air. Upon further inspection I see 3 mylar balloons wrapped up in the high voltage wires feeding a transformer and apparently the kids came up with the idea to...well I'm not actually sure.

I thought this could be an issue as I have seen a poco video where they put mylar balloons into high voltage lines and mad a bit of a arc. I call them and tell them what is happening and they tell me to go and tell their parent to have them stop doing that and that they will not come to retrieve the balloons.

So do I do just have to much time on my hands?
 
we made 6 foot bolos with bare 20 AWG and old spark plugs 60 years ago and threw them onto the 13kV line in the neighborhood, nice little light show. (for some reason as a kid thought using spark plugs would help the arc).
 
Tell them its their responsibility to take the balloons down because next rain storm those will arc up. If not at any moment. But what does poco care:lol: As for the kids politely tell them not to worry about the balloons.
 
junkhound said:
we made 6 foot bolos with bare 20 AWG and old spark plugs 60 years ago and threw them onto the 13kV line in the neighborhood, nice little light show. (for some reason as a kid thought using spark plugs would help the arc).
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Finally found you! Our attorneys will be contacting you in the morning, if they are still alive.
 
On lower voltages such as 7200, Mylar balloons are not usually a big deal. They may cause sparks, but don't "blow stuff up". In a substation, with voltages in the 100K+ range, they can do big damage. Either way, though, any POCO that doesn't respond to a customer's information should take a hard look at their attitude. Any time the public offers a helping hand, they should be publicly thanked! Without the public, we, as utilities, are pretty much working in the dark (pun intended) when outages occur.

Well done!
 
meternerd said:
On lower voltages such as 7200, Mylar balloons are not usually a big deal. They may cause sparks, but don't "blow stuff up". In a substation, with voltages in the 100K+ range, they can do big damage. Either way, though, any POCO that doesn't respond to a customer's information should take a hard look at their attitude. Any time the public offers a helping hand, they should be publicly thanked! Without the public, we, as utilities, are pretty much working in the dark (pun intended) when outages occur.

Well done!
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If it was just the lines I probably wouldn't have called but a transformer was on the same pole. Does that increase the danger?
 
RLyons said:
If it was just the lines I probably wouldn't have called but a transformer was on the same pole. Does that increase the danger?
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It all depends on where the fault is. If there's equipment on the pole, there's more wiring exposed. Transformer primary terminals, lightning arresters, cutouts, etc. Either way, metal foil and electricity are not a real healthy combination. Most distribution wiring is one phase and a neutral. If the phase wire and neutral become connected by whatever means, an outage is likely. With no calls from the public, utilities are left with driving the lines looking for the problem. Not always obvious. We don't like to "close in" for a test until we have patrolled all of the affected lines. Hate to energize a line laying across someone's car or worse. Makes it much easier if a customer calls and says they heard a bang or saw a flash.
 
It's funny what people near Boston think of as the boonies. I had a much different opinion of the boonies when I lived in New Mexico and you could drive hours without seeing a man-made structure. Then I get up here and people think Nashua, NH is the boonies.
 
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